


the great fall

by coldmackerel



Category: Until Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Kind of a character study, my take on how things can go bad sometimes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-20
Updated: 2016-01-20
Packaged: 2018-05-15 02:52:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,174
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5768572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coldmackerel/pseuds/coldmackerel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>most tragedies have five acts. josh liked to think his had 13.<br/>and if he was being perfectly honest, they didn't make much sense. but maybe it's what sticks with us that means the most.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the great fall

**Author's Note:**

> _Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,_   
>  _Humpty Dumpty had a great fall._   
>  _All the king’s horses and all the king’s men,_   
>  _Couldn’t put Humpty together again._

 

 

A great way to set yourself up for failure is to climb higher than you were ever meant to climb. Maybe we’re not meant to climb at all. But Josh couldn’t help it.

He liked the view too much.

But you’ve got to have a good foothold when you climb. And having spent the better part of the last few years listening to Sam talk about climbing, you would think he’d have picked up on that. But Josh liked danger and bad decisions and anything categorically ill-advised. He liked drinking heavily, driving fast, and staying out all night. At heart, who doesn’t?

So Josh climbed high to all of the best precarious branches life had to offer, because he always had someone running around underneath him with a mattress. Beth and Hannah would each grab an end, despite their complaints. They’d driven him to the hospital when he was drunk beyond comprehension, faked doctor’s notes, and stayed out all night trying to find him.

And he kept them safe.

That was his only job.

“Josh, you’d literally be dead without us,” they would say.

Then he might laugh and say something like, “I’m never going to learn how to ride a bike if you guys insist on being my training wheels.” And Beth would be pissed for a day because anger was her emotional regulator for all things, including worry. Hannah would be overly nice to compensate, because she knew why he did what he did most of the time. But it would all blow over within the week when Josh kidnapped them for an overnight road trip or some other grand gesture. He was good at grand gestures. He was good at being the cool older brother. So the training wheels stayed on.

If Beth and Hannah were his training wheels, then Sam was Josh’s helmet. She was tough and consistent and he was wracked with jealousy because of it. When he lashed out, though, it glanced off of her like – well, like a helmet.

“Your sarcasm is unbecoming,” Josh would deflect when she got the better of him. “You’re gonna die alone, Sammy.”

She’d just grin at him. He kind of thought she grinned like a pirate - all roguish abandon and devil-may-care, like she had met a thousand other scurvy devils way more intimidating than him. “Well we _both_ can’t die alone or we’d be dying together.”

“In your dreams, princess.”

More like in _his_ dreams. Needless to say, he had a lot of weird dreams involving pirates.

There’s just something undeniably attractive about your successful counterpart. It’s like someone made Josh, analyzed everything that went wrong, perfected the model, and then made Sam.

Fucker.

Chris was the only fun one. They were under a strict contract to ignore each other’s problems, so neither was ever in danger of a lecture from the other. Was it healthy? Josh liked to think that sometimes the best therapy is no therapy at all. In a word: denial. It ain’t just a river in Egypt.

“Are you sure you’re okay, dude? I don’t wanna be _that_ guy, but you haven’t been to class in more than a week.” Chris tried to sound casual, but Josh could hear the undertones of worry and guilt.

Josh laughed. “Dude, you know me: I’ll show up when it’s worth showing up for. That’s my motto.”

Chris sighed. “What’s a motto?”

“Nothin’, what’s a motto you?”

But more often than not, Chris gave Josh the normalcy he craved. In retrospect, Josh wasn’t sure how much Chris ever really knew about his problems. The dude was no intellectual slouch, though. So Chris probably knew. The idea that his denial was an active favor rather than blissful ignorance just endeared him further to Josh. Sometimes the hardest thing to do for someone is nothing at all.

And with Training Wheels 1 and 2 and their trusty Safety Helmet partner in crime, Josh had more than enough healthy concern in his life. It’s all about balance.

Chris would get wasted with him, Beth and Hannah would cover his ass, then Sam would guilt him into a corner and he would stay sober for the month.

Balance.

Hell, maybe it wasn’t exactly functional in the traditional sense, but it had its moments. Reflection on those moments yielded only poorly filed flashes of emotion and jumbled memories that he hadn’t even realized he held dear. Happiness is kind of funny that way. You’re not always aware of it in the moment. Maybe you just have to wait to see how shitty your life ends up before deciding what truly meant something to you.

When Josh fell, he brought only 13 things with him. The rest was lost.

 

**_Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall._ **

 

Act 1

“Chris, I’m tellin’ you, I don’t know why I ever leave this place,” Josh slurred, gesturing vaguely with his plastic cup at the messy contents of his bedroom. “Everything I need is right-“ Josh hiccupped – “here.”

“I’m not sure I’m ready for that kind of commitment, dude.” Chris tipped back the rest of his horrible drink, stifling an involuntary gag. “But check back with me in two more drinks.”

Josh nodded seriously, attempting his best impersonation of a sober person. “Two drinks? Bro, you’re two drinks from a one-night stand with me. We’re at least five drinks from lifelong commitment.”

“How many drinks until you blow me?”

Josh frowned at the torn fabric of his jeans. “Uh, how many have I had?”

“Five, maybe?”

“Then five drinks ago, my dude,” he laughed, raising his cup in a toast. Chris returned the gesture and they clicked drinks clumsily. Josh polished off the rest of his own drink and stood carefully to refill them both from the assorted bottles on his desk. Their options weren’t great, but under the age of 21 you just drink what you can squirrel away and pretend you’re enjoying it.

“Jägermeister?” Josh called over his shoulder.

Chris groaned. “Is that all we’ve got left? That shit gives me the spins.”

“Yeah, unless you want straight vodka. I’ll end you if you barf on my bed, though.”

Josh mixed some truly unfortunate drinks and turned up the scratchy vinyl he had playing. It was some sultry 50s ballad and Chris groaned louder. “Your music sucks.”

“I’m setting the mood,” Josh laughed. “What do you want me to blow you to? The Lord of the Rings Soundtrack?”

Chris snatched a pen off of the nightstand and chucked it at him. Josh would’ve chucked it back right at his stupid nerd face, but someone started banging their fist against his locked door. “What?” Josh snapped. “I’m about to platonically suck my best friend’s dick! It’s not gay if the lights are off.”

Mortified, Chris pulled one of Josh’s pillows over his head. Upon further reflection, Josh probably should have made sure it wasn’t his parents. He was saved from eternal shame when Beth’s irate voice filtered in under his door. “Spare me the mental image, Josh. Did you jack my booze?”

“Shwa? No. Nope. No jacking. Not today, anyways. No stealing either.”

Beth pounded more insistently on his door. “Hannah told me you took it, dumbass.”

Josh stomped his foot indignantly. “Hannah!”

“Sorry!” Hannah called back apologetically. “I’m bad at lying.”

“Open the door, traitor!” Beth began rattling his doorknob. Joke was on her, though, because they’d already consumed most of her stash.

“Traitor? The traitor’s right next to you,” Josh snorted. “Hannah, does our sibling bond mean nothing to you? I bought you Subway!”

“I’m sorry, Josh!”

“ _Subway_ , Hannah!”

They say that miners brought canaries with them into the mines, because the canary would stop singing when the air got toxic or something. Josh wouldn’t call Beth’s anger anything resembling a cheerful canary chirp, but if he hadn’t been so smashed he might’ve taken the sudden silence as indicative of his imminent death.

Not a minute later and the lock popped open. Josh watched in horror as his bedroom door swung open, slowly and ominously. Sam was still crouched over with two paperclips and a triumphant (pirate) smirk on her stupid, pretty face. Beth looked ready to carry out his execution.

“I’m surrounded by traitors,” Josh said sourly, holding up his hands in surrender. “Sammy, your constant need to emasculate me is unattractive. Also, you’re gonna teach me how to pick a lock when I can see straight again.”

“Sorry we drank your booze,” Chris offered sheepishly from under his pillow. “Josh said it was his.”

“Traitor number three reveals himself,” Josh lamented. “You guys suck.”

Beth strode into his room like she owned the damn place and examined the mess he and Chris had made. As she passed Josh by, she slapped the bottom of his cup upwards, upending its contents on his shirt. “Asshole,” she snickered, pouring herself an unhealthy amount of scotch from Josh’s personal stash.

Hannah offered him a guilty smile before pouring herself a more responsibly sized drink.

“You got something on your shirt,” Sam said sweetly, joining Chris on the bed. She plucked the cup from his hand and took a gulp before returning it to him. “Eugh. Chris, buddy. Let me mix your drink next time. Josh made you battery acid.”

“Well excuse my impaired ass,” Josh muttered, chucking his empty cup on the ground. There were various noises of protest when he pulled his ruined shirt over his head and tossed it in the corner, but it was his room and his rules. If he wanted to be naked, they couldn’t so much as choose which half remained clothed. Besides, Sam threw a blanket over him when he flopped down on the middle of the bed, sparing them his naked self

Their party of two became a little less pathetic with Sam and the twins, but Josh couldn’t really recall the rest of the night. He remembered knocking skulls with a few of them on his crowded mattress while they warbled along to old records and polished off the booze. When the specifics of a moment fade from memory, all you have left is the feeling it leaves you with. Maybe he remembered this one because it combined two of his favorite emotions: simple and drunk.

 

Act 2

“Do you think it’s broken?”

Josh glanced over at Sam, but kept his head tilted back and the washcloth pressed hard against his throbbing nose. He held her gaze in critical silence for a moment, before she looked away.

“Sorry. It’s probably better if you don’t talk,” she stammered, wringing her hands anxiously in her lap.

It was cold out – too cold to be sitting on a stoop outside without jackets. But you don’t exactly get into a fistfight with the host of the party and stick around for dessert. Sam looked almost guilty, though, so Josh heaved a sigh and gingerly removed the rag from his face. It was pretty much saturated anyways. He spit a wad of blood on the ground and offered her a pained grimace.

“Nonsense, I’m ready for round two, Ref.” When he tried to grin at her, though, she looked kind of horrified. Oh, right. Bloody teeth.

The blood started trickling down his lips again, so Josh stuffed the bloody rag back up under his nose. It was probably broken.

“We should take you to the hospital.”

Josh shook his head adamantly. “I hate hospitals.” Sam didn’t look like she thought that was a good reason. “Besides,” he lied, “I don’t think it’s broken. That guy hit like a pansy. If _you_ had hit me, I’d be dining with Jesus tonight.”

Sam offered him a sad smile. “I can handle myself you know.”

“Um, duh. I just said you hit like a freight train,” he laughed, choking a bit on the blood leaking down the back of his throat.

“You think that’s the first time I’ve been groped at a party?”

Josh rolled his eyes. “Oh, geez, seriously? How many more guys do I have to fight? My face can’t take much more of this.”

Slapping his arm lightly, Sam huffed in exasperation. “All I’m saying is that you didn’t have to do that. That guy was like twice your size, idiot.”

A car with a badly damaged muffler roared down the street, hiccupping and spouting exhaust into the air. The two of them watched it pass before he could form a response. “Sorry, Sammy. I didn’t mean to embarrass you. I forget to turn off big brother mode sometimes.” Josh snapped his fingers. “How about this: next time a dude grabs my butt at a party, you can throw down in my honor. Deal?”

Sam shook her head fondly. “Sure, Josh. C’mon, you gotta keep pressure on that,” she murmured, reaching out to push the filthy rag harder against his nose. He allowed it even though it was a little more painful when he let her do it. “And thanks, I guess.”

“I gotcha, Sammy,” he managed around the rag. “Next time, catch the eye of a smaller bastard, though, would you?”

Beth burst through the back door, accidentally kicking Josh in the spine. “Shit, cops are coming. Time to clear out, Sylvester Stallone,” she said brusquely, nudging the two of them off the stoop. “This is the last time we come to a party on the south side. How’s your nose, loser?”

“Been better.”

Hannah came rushing out next and yanked Josh into a hug from behind. “Oh my god, Josh. That guy almost killed you!”

Josh frowned. “Okay, I didn’t do _that_ bad.”

Beth shook her head and shoved them all toward her car. “No, you did. I kind of started brainstorming your eulogy there for a moment.”

Hannah seemed on the verge of tears. “You shouldn’t have done that! You should’ve – well, you should’ve let Beth fight him or something. What were you thinking?”

Josh decided that he had never had any masculinity and probably never would.

“Oh, lay off him,” Sam sighed, grabbing his arm and pulling him forward. “He got his face broken for me. It’s your guys’ fault that your little sister mojo rubbed off on me. Technically, it’s _your_ fault.”

“It ain’t my fault he’s an idiot,” Beth scoffed, shoving them in her car. Police sirens wailed in the distance and she cursed under her breath. “Buckle up, kids. And don’t let him bleed on my car.”

Josh fell asleep on the ride home, lulled into a pleasant mood by whiskey and Beth humming along to the radio. Somewhere during that time, Josh decided that home was a fluid thing. He was home long before Beth dragged him through the doors of their parents’ mansion and tucked him into bed.

And yeah. His nose was broken.

 

Act 3

“You want some Goldfish?”

“No.”

Chris shook the bag in front of his face. “Yeah you do. They’re the snack that smiles back, dude.”

“Get those smiling fish out of my goddamn face.”

Beth reached over and snatched the bag out of Chris’s hand. “He hates Goldfish. I’m pretty sure he also hates happiness.”

Josh grunted, eyes still fixed on the television. He couldn’t actually remember the rest of the movie. But he _did_ remember Chris falling asleep on Beth and Beth throwing Goldfish at Josh’s face all night because it was somehow _his_ fault Chris drooled on her.

He had no idea why this stuck with him.

 

Act 4

“He’s an idiot,” Josh insisted.

Hannah shrugged miserably and wiped her nose on the back of her hand. “I guess that means I’m an idiot too. He’s just one of those people that can make anyone feel special, you know?”

No, not really. Maybe it took one to know one, but Josh had always known Mike was superficially charming as an automatic response to social situations. He wasn’t a bad guy – he just didn’t know how to turn it off. Josh had the same problem sometimes, so he tried not to get too down on the guy.

“You’re _not_ an idiot.” Hannah gave him a skeptical look and Josh shrugged. “You just have the courage to admit you want to feel special. Let me clue you in on a little secret, though.” Josh lowered his voice to a whisper and leaned toward where she sat next to him. “You were special before Mike Munroe. And you’re gonna be special after.”

Hannah was the only one who could get him to say such sickly sweet garbage and actually mean it. Hopefully Beth wasn’t within earshot. She would absolutely crucify him with this.

It was worth it, though. Hannah laughed a watery laugh and leaned against his shoulder. “You’re just saying that to make me feel better.”

“Duh. The world’s a better place when you feel better.” He grinned at her and she gave him one last squeeze before scooping her backpack up and heading to Sam’s house. When he got up and rounded the corner a few minutes later, Beth was leaning against the wall looking moodier than usual.

“What’s the latest, sibling? Anything from the front lines?”

Beth narrowed her eyes and seemed on the verge of saying something snarky, but appeared to think better of it. She released her irritation in a long sigh. “That was nice – what you said to her. I know you’re kind of an emotional dunce, but I’m never sure how to cheer her up when it comes to that stuff. So thanks, I guess.”

Josh grinned. “Whatever do you mean? I haven’t seen Hannah all day.”

“Right. Want to go egg Mike’s house?”

“If you wanted a hug too, all you had to do was ask.”

It could easily have been his overactive imagination, but when Josh pulled her into a smothering hug, her protests and insults were just a bit weaker than usual. Maybe that’s why he remembered it. Or maybe he remembered it because egging Mike’s house was honestly super satisfying.

 

Act 5

“Couldn’t I just pay you to date him?” Josh groaned, leaning a little too far back in his chair. Any further and he would go toppling back. “You won’t regret it. He’s a great kisser after five shots of tequila. I think. I don’t really remember. I had a lot more.”

Ashley reddened slightly, but avoided humoring him with indulging in distraction and petty gossip. “I didn’t come over for you to pawn Chris off on me,” she said sternly. “If you want to pass Calculus, you’re gonna have to focus.”

“If I pass Calculus, will you date Chris?”

Ashley rolled her eyes. “Sure, Josh. Hell, if you pass Calculus, I’ll date anyone you want me to.”

Chewing on his pencil, Josh considered the offer. “What do you think, Matt? Am I getting shafted on this deal?”

Matt, unlike Josh, was hyper-focused on Ashley’s tutoring. Also unlike Josh, Matt had a lot to lose if he didn’t pass his classes. He hung on Ashley’s words like the lord’s prayer, nodding earnestly and scribbling notes. Who would Matt be if he weren’t a football player? That reality didn’t exactly compute. “Huh? Uh, yeah, sure,” he answered, not even sparing Josh a glance.

“Matt thinks I’m getting shafted here, Ash.”

Ashley gave him a withering look. “Get back to work, Josh.” There must have been some sort of challenge in Josh’s eyes, because she pointed a threatening finger at him. “I know for a fact that Sam is up in Hannah’s room right now and so help me god, I’ll tell her you’re flunking on purpose. I promise I’m a lot nicer than she’ll be.”

Josh snatched his pencil off the table and twirled it between his fingers. “So? What is she, my keeper?” He muttered.

“Apparently. You only listen to her.”

Josh scoffed and doodled absently on his meager notes. “I answer to no one. Sam’s just better at bothering me, because she’s so annoying.”

“Who’s annoying?”

Typical.

Sam swept past them toward the fridge and snatched _his_ orange juice and poured it into _his_ glass. “What’s up Samuel L. Jackson?” Josh called, eyeing the orange juice possessively.

“Ashley and Matt. And a massive pile of homework. That’s interesting,” Sam pondered, ignoring Josh completely. “Let me guess: Josh is failing something again. I’m gonna guess…physics?”

“Calculus,” Ashley supplied, checking over Matt’s homework while he hovered anxiously. He did this endearing little victory fist every time Ashley marked one right.

Josh leaned forward so all four legs of his chair touched the ground. “You’re overreacting. This is just a calculus experiment. If my laziness and Ashley’s determination are functions of x, how close can I get to failure before you intervene?”

“Yikes,” Sam grimaced. “You’re worse than I thought. Say no more, I’ll be your lifecoach, Josh.”

Yikes, indeed.

Sam stayed with him late into the night, long past Ashley and Matt’s departure. By the time the sun began peaking over the horizon, Josh had a lot more sympathy for dogs on leashes. He made every effort to pull them off topic and end his suffering, but Sam kept him glued to functions and formulas all damn night.

Looking back, he couldn’t remember any calculus. But he did remember how excited they all were when he passed. And Matt was inadvertently right. Josh totally got shafted on Ashley’s deal.

 

 

**_Humpty Dumpty had a great fall._ **

 

 

People say that falling is quick. Suddenly you’re on your back, winded and staring at the sky, wondering how you ended up there. But it only feels quick because we have notoriously shitty memory capacity. You wonder how you ended up on the ground because you weren’t _aware_ you were falling when it was happening.

Falling is a process.

It came back to him slowly, in jumbled pieces and feelings like hieroglyphics etched on the back of his brain that he might have been able to read if he could only understand the language.

They called it a lot of things growing up. He’s manic depressive. He’s bipolar. He’s got generalized anxiety disorder. It’s schizophrenia for sure this time. Narcissistic personality disorder. He’s on drugs. He needs drugs. He’s faking it.

Or the scariest one: we have no idea what this is.

And so on.

“They just want a word for their files,” Beth used to assure him.

Josh just wanted to feel better.

But he was fine.

‘Fine’ is the universal status quo of humanity – absolute neutrality. It certainly doesn’t mean you’re good, but you’re surviving and better than miserable. When did he stop being fine? Maybe that was when he started to fall.

Josh stopped being fine when his training wheels fell off.

 

Act 6

This one is clearest to him, even though it’s hazy and confusing. It never strays far from thought.

A man in a uniform woke him up by knocking his flashlight harshly against the counter next to Josh’s face. The sound jolted him out of his drunken stupor and the first thing Josh did was throw his arm out and swipe an empty bottle onto the floor. It shattered when it hit the ground and caused the park ranger to jump slightly.

Josh’s first thought was that the ranger was about to slap him with seven tickets for supplying alcohol to minors. “What’s goin’ on?” He asked, rubbing his eyes. “Whatever it is: I didn’t do it. What time is it?”

The ranger furrowed his brows and clicked his flashlight on, shining it straight into Josh’s protesting eyes. “How much have you been drinking, son?”

“Not enough for this bullshit,” Josh grumbled, shielding his eyes from the light. But it was a fair question. Josh couldn’t remember shit. In fact, the last thing he remembered was hauling everyone’s luggage up from the cable car station to the lodge. As his senses returned and fell into place, he appraised his surroundings uneasily. Identically dressed rangers stood around, speaking in low tones with a small collection of his friends, writing on notepads. “What the hell is going on?” He asked dumbly.

Suddenly, the ranger looked uncomfortable. That was the first of many uncomfortable looks Josh would receive over the next year. “You’re Josh Washington, right?”

The one and only. “What’s going on?” Josh repeated, ignoring the question. He turned to look behind him and made eye contact with Chris. It was enough to know something was wrong by the abnormally pale tint to his skin. Maybe it was the bottle of Jameson sitting in his stomach, but Josh fought the sudden urge to vomit.

“Son, we’re with the park police. Your sisters are missing.”

Then he barfed. It probably wasn’t the alcohol.

When Josh finally got his feet under him, the ground tilted dangerously. Once again, he thought it was the Jameson. But when he sobered up later that night, the ground under his feet remained unsteady. It never really stabilized again.

 

Act 7

Josh hadn’t had a drink since he woke up to a world without his sisters. Alcohol was the real culprit, right? Sure, dumbass.

It was a convenient thing to blame anyways. Blame’s like a makeshift bandage on a wound: it’ll make you feel a bit better for a while, but it’s eventually gonna get infected. If you let it fester, you’re gonna lose that limb.

Josh didn’t drink anymore. But god did he want to.

Mr. Washington started leaving the liquor cabinet unlocked – sometimes even wide open. It was kind of fucked up, but Josh couldn’t help but wonder if it was his silent, shameful permission for Josh to drink himself to death. Spitefully, Josh declined.

These dry spells were intermittent at best, though.

“Why don’t you drink anymore?” Beth sneered. “That used to be _all_ you did.”

No. Not Beth. It was just a flicker at the corner of his peripheral, fizzing in and out of reality by the whims of Josh’s misfiring synapses. It’s an odd thing to be wholly convinced of the existence of what you know isn’t true. So no, Beth wasn’t there. But a hallucination is only a hallucination to someone who’s never had one.

Josh drummed his fingers against the countertop. The sun had long since disappeared behind the red maples in the backyard, but he had made no attempt to turn any lights on in the kitchen. His parents were out figuring out the next step in the twins’ disappearance. Three days had passed since the search was called off and nobody seemed to know what to do with two potentially dead children. Funeral? Candlelight vigil? Maintain hope?

Josh decided to just sit in his kitchen.

“Kinda lost my taste for it, I guess,” he returned glumly, tapping out an old nursery rhyme pattern with his nails.

Not-Beth slammed her hand on the table, causing Josh to jump slightly. “Do _something_ ,” she pleaded. “How can you just _sit_ there?”

When he tried to look at her, she glided out of his focus, back to the periphery where he couldn’t confront her. Tiredly, he let his head drop into his hands and scratched at his scalp. “I don’t know,” he whispered. “I don’t know what to do.”

“It’s too late to _do_ something,” Beth snapped. “You should’ve _done_ something when we ran out into the woods that night.” Josh shut his eyes tightly, but it wouldn’t rid him of her voice. “But I’d rather see you bleed than do nothing, I guess.”

“It wasn’t my fault,” he tried reasoning.

Beth laughed wickedly in his ear. “Does that make you feel better?”

“No.”

“What are you now, Josh?” Her face swam into view in flickering intervals, too close and too cruel to really be her. It took everything for Josh to avert his eyes, roaming the walls and the furniture – anything else. “I want to see the look on your face when you figure out just who you are without us.”

But the truth of the matter was, Josh had already figured out what he was without them. Losing someone you love can be very dangerous indeed. If you make them the best part of you, their absence leaves you with a person you might not like.

Finally, Josh turned fully to face the apparition. It was just a shadow in Beth’s shape with eyes blacker than tar. “I’m nobody,” he returned, his own sneer pulling at the corners of his mouth. “Maybe I always was.”

Beth laughed cruelly before dissolving into the emptiness of the house, her presence an echo in the massive, solemn hallways and unoccupied rooms.

“But I did rather enjoy being a brother,” he admitted to the pitiless thin air. “I really did.”

And because he was nobody, Josh nudged the already-open liquor cabinet just a little wider and accepted his father’s expensive whiskey, shamefully offered in lieu of anything parental or comforting. He brainstormed to the bottom of six glasses and figured out what to do with two potentially dead girls. You dig them out of your heart with a rusty spoon and let yourself feel who you’re going to be without them.

Being nobody hurt a lot less.

 

Act 8

“Sir, have you been drinking tonight?”

“Shockingly, no,” Josh groaned, reaching a hand up to fiddle with the tubes and wires being taped to his arms and chest. “I’m fine, alright?”

The paramedic gave him a queer look. “You drove straight into a tree,” he replied, voice flat and clinical. “Are you or have you ever felt suicidal?”

“I don’t know, I was pretty bummed at the end of All Quiet on the Western Front,” Josh deflected, removing more wires while others were put in their place. “Can’t you just stitch me up here? I’ll call a cab and we can chalk this up to me being an awful driver.”

Nobody believed him, of course. What he really wanted to say was that if he were to kill himself, he’d use a loaded revolver and spare himself the mess of throwing himself through a windshield. That didn’t really seem like the smartest way to get out of a psych evaluation, though, so he kept it to himself. The only worse way to get out of a psych evaluation would be to tell them why he had _actually_ crashed into Grandmother Willow. He wasn’t painting with all the colors of the wind, that was for damn sure.

He saw them.

They were standing off in the distance, faceless and gaunt as always. He saw them everywhere, really. They stood outside his window and loomed behind his parents and haunted his dreams. Ever since the search had been called off, Josh ceased praying to see them again. All he _did_ was see them. He hadn’t slept in weeks.

He wasn’t exactly sure why, but when they had stood in the treeline along route 31 that night, glaring silently as they always did, he’d just kind of snapped. Driving into your hallucinations isn’t the best way to get rid of them, but hell, it’s not the least satisfying thing you can do for yourself. It was a damn shame that the tree caught his bumper before the faceless twins did.

The paramedic shook his head and sighed, rubbing a hand in absent comfort into Josh’s collarbone, like he forgot that Josh wasn’t some tearful kid with a broken arm. He looked just as tired as Josh felt. “I can’t make you tell us what happened. I get that you don’t want to talk about it. Are you gonna be okay if we let you go home?”

Josh shrugged. “If I figure out how to stop driving into trees, I’m sure I will be,” he lied smoothly. “I promise I’ll practice.”

If he could just appear solemn and apologetic for two goddamn seconds, they’d probably let him go. He was so close. “Tell you what,” the paramedic said, holding out Josh’s slightly damaged phone. “Call someone. Call just one person and tell them what happened to you so I know you’re not alone, alright? Then I’ll let you go.”

“Fine,” Josh grumbled, accepting his phone. It was a little stressful having the paramedic hover over him, but he took his time scrolling until he landed on someone he knew would be there for him. They wouldn’t judge or write him off with some excuse. He trusted them with his life. Confidently, he tapped their contact and held the phone up to his ear, flashing the paramedic a thumbs up.

When they picked up Josh grinned. “Hi. I just got into a car accident because I accidentally drove into a tree. Can you believe that? Oh, yeah, I’m good. The paramedic asked me to call someone and let them know what happened, so I figured I’d give you a call. It’s been one of those days, you know? But anyways, you don’t get paid to listen to me shoot the shit all night.”

The paramedic’s look of approval fell into one of confusion.

Josh held a finger up just in case the man was getting any funny ideas about interrupting. “Anyways,” Josh went on. “I’ll take a large bacon and pineapple pizza for delivery. 1214 Branwick Boulevard. And you better delay delivery by about an hour, I’ve probably gotta go apologize to a tree or something. Yep. Okay. Thanks, bye.”

It probably wasn’t a good idea to piss off the people who could kill you with a thousand different drugs and nobody would be the wiser. It certainly looked like the paramedic was going to murder him. “Who the hell was that?”

“Pizza Hut.”

It was funny at the time, but the pizza was cold by the late hour in which he returned home. His phone sat quietly on the countertop and he stared at it while he ate, wondering if he should’ve actually called someone who cared what happened to him. It wasn’t too late. All he had to do was pick up the damn phone. What was he, some kind of coward? Dial a number, tell them what happened. Tell them you need help. Tell them you’re drowning. Tell them something real for once in your damn life.

But Josh Washington _was_ some kind of coward.

He was the worst kind of coward: the kind afraid to be happy.

So Josh ate his cold pizza alone and wondered if when a car hits a tree and nobody’s around to hear it, does it make a noise?

 

Act 9

“Want to see how many skittles I can fit in my mouth?”

Josh glanced sideways at the kid swinging next to him on the playground and grinned slyly as he rattled a large bag of the colorful candies. The kid looked like she was maybe seven or eight years old and was missing more teeth than was probably natural at that age. “What’re you some kinda weirdo?” She asked suspiciously.

Josh recoiled, cradling his skittles like a tangible wound. “What the hell is that supposed to mean? I’m just trying to be friendly.”

“You’re not supposed to say that word,” the toothless kid returned with a superior look. “Mom says swears make you sound _uninteliment_.”

“It’s unintelligent, idiot.” Josh kicked the mulch a bit with his shoe, quickly losing his desire to consume 54 ounces of skittles. “Swears make me sound _unintelligent_.” The words had barely left his mouth when he realized his accidental admission with mild horror. If it had been socially acceptable to punch someone else’s kid for looking so smug, he would’ve gone for it.

“Gotcha!”

Josh rolled his eyes and pulled open the seal on the bag. “Whatever. Do you want to see me break this world record or not?”

“I shouldn’t be talking to weirdos.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Keep count for me, gremlin.”

Josh really shouldn’t have been gorging himself on corn syrup and artificial flavoring, but he had stopped showing up to therapy altogether and had to find some way to occupy himself on Wednesday afternoons so his parents didn’t get suspicious. The park was as good a place as any to look creepy and dejected.

“You’re gonna ‘splode.”

Josh tried to retort around all seventy-two Skittles, but realized too late what a fatal flaw that was. His life almost ended in a choking haze of bright colors and indistinguishable berry flavoring. The world record went up in flames as all seventy-two candies clattered to the ground in a puddle of technicolor drool.

“Look what you _did_!” Josh wheezed, lungs burning from inhaled sugar.

Finally, the kid cracked a smile, but covered it quickly with the back of her hand. “You’re so weird. Don’t you have any friends to play with?”

“I don’t know. I think they feel weird around me, so I don’t really talk to them much anymore,” he said honestly. It’s not like he’d ever see her again.

The girl considered his answer thoughtfully. “Why?”

Eh, why not. “My sisters died.”

Josh thought maybe he had finally scared her enough for her to leave, because she didn’t say anything for a while. Finally she turned her head and gave him an earnest look. “That’s really sad. Now I get why you’re weird.”

“I’m not weird,” Josh protested weakly. “You’re weird. And short.”

She looked a little offended at first, but continued staring at him with those weird, overly large, uncanny alien eyes that all kids have. Josh looked straight ahead, determined not to be insulted by a child again and goaded into an argument that he should’ve been too mature for. It was almost time to head home anyways.

“You’re a _little_ weird,” she insisted. Before Josh could disagree, she continued. “But you seem really sad, too. Are you sad about your sisters?”

“Um,” Josh hummed, scratching the back of his head. Sad? He’d spent a lot of time being angry, confused, frustrated, scared, and numb – always, a lingering numbness. But sadness was for people who had something taken from them, not for people who had let their own selfish recklessness self-destruct it. But the question struck a chord in him and he found himself nodding.

“Yeah. I guess I am sad.”

She nodded too. “That’s okay. You’re supposed to be.”

The entire drive home, Josh wondered if that was true. Was this just the way things were _supposed_ to be? Was his sickening plummet just a scripted, biological reaction to category 5 loss? Was he just a standard cocktail of appropriate reactions to something as ordinary as death? People die all the time.

Was his situation really a tragedy if it was so goddamn common?

His parents weren’t there when he got back. What else was new. The framed family picture had been taken off the counter and hidden behind the knife block. He couldn’t remember when it had disappeared from the counter, but he pulled it out and set it back where it belonged. On a whim, he made tea from the loose tealeaves that Hannah had always used. They had been untouched since her disappearance – nobody else even drank tea in the Washington household.

It smelled like rose petals and cinnamon.

And even though it was common and ugly, Josh let tears pool in his eyes for the first time since a park ranger had shined a flashlight in his eyes and tilted the ground underneath his feet forever with just a few words.

Because that’s just what you’re supposed to do.

 

**_All the king’s horses and all the king’s men._ **

 

 

People want to help – even if they’re bad at it.

Just remember that.

 

Act 10

Remember that thing about blame being a poor medical treatment for grief? It’s not sterile. You really shouldn’t use it as a bandage.

It’s gonna get infected.

And you won’t notice it rotting you inside out under the bandage.

But if you look close enough, you might see the symptoms.

“Josh, is that you?”

For whatever reason, Josh fought the urge to make like a nut and bolt out of the hardware store. Images of policemen shining flashlights in his eyes, fingers twitching near ticket books, flashed briefly in his mind. “Uh, no,” he supplied lamely, turning his back more fully on the curious voice, like the plastic pipe couplings were really that interesting.

“Oh, c’mon, man.”

Breathing out heavily through his nose, Josh turned and plastered a fake smile on his face. As if a day when your plumbing fails could get any worse. “What’s up, Mike? Getting some supplies for your plumber porno?”

“Is that what you’re doing? Shit, I hope we didn’t answer the same casting call.” Mike countered with a laugh.

Josh laughed too, but it barely qualified as an actual laugh. “Actually, I’ll be starring opposite of you. My safeword is Ronald Reagan.” He wasn’t there to plan a porno with Mike, though. “Anyways. I’ve gotta get home and fix my pipes in a non-sexual way. Peace out, boy scout.”

There was surely no god, because Mike didn’t take the hint. “Wait, I haven’t seen you in forever!” He said kindly, grabbing Josh’s shoulder and squeezing it. It occurred to him that Mike had probably temporarily forgotten to consider why that might’ve been. Instead of responding, Josh gave him a tight smile and waited for reality to sink in. When it did, Mike’s face fell a bit and he looked slightly more awkward. “Well, I mean, I understand why. It’s cool – not that there’s a reason it wouldn’t be cool? We’re cool. I mean, of course we are, right?”

There was something kind of satisfying about watching Mike flounder, but Josh decided to put him out of both of their miseries. “Yeah, don’t sweat it Mike. I’m just taking some time to myself, you know?”

Mike nodded quickly, relief washing over his face at being spared further embarrassment. “Of course, dude. We all get it. And, uh-“ Mike faltered, a decision evident on his face. “Well, I guess I just want to say I’m sorry.”

“I know,” Josh supplied routinely. He had to field a lot of apologies and they kind of lost their meaning after a few weeks.

Mike’s gaze fell down to his shoes for a moment and then sought Josh’s eyes with a little more humility. “It doesn’t mean much, does it?” He laughed humorlessly, eyes sad and timid. Josh had never seen that expression on him.

What the hell was he supposed to say to that? He settled for a shrug.

“Yeah, it doesn’t help,” Mike concluded, releasing Josh’s shoulder. “You need something more than an apology.” He searched Josh’s eyes a moment longer before sighing. “Well, I hope you find it – whatever you need. It’ll never be right what happened to them. But maybe you’ll find a way to make it less wrong somehow.” Smile back in place, Mike turned to leave. “Let me know if I can do anything for you, Josh. See you around.”

Josh watched him leave and wondered what he needed. What could make any of it “less wrong”? Josh wanted his sisters back, that’s what he needed. That can’t have been what Mike meant, though.

He needed absolution.

But that was for those who deserved it.

He needed to feel something. He needed compensation. He needed things to be fair. He needed justice. He needed someone to hurt for what happened.

He needed revenge.

 

Act 11

“Motherfucker.”

“I didn’t do anything!”

“Yeah, I know,” Josh murmured. “I slipped on my own banana peel again.”

Chris snorted, but kept his eyes locked on the screen. “You still suck at this game. Stop throwing items ahead of you, dumbass.”

Josh rattled his control irritably and shifted slightly on the couch. “Christopher, my dude. Life’s about the journey, not who gets there first.”

“This is Mario Kart, _dude_. Getting there first is literally the entire point.”

Yeah, but when you’ve been a loser your whole life, you develop an affinity for downplaying the value of winning. “I don’t need to win to have fun,” Josh defended before accidentally driving his car off a bridge. “Fuck.”

Approximately four seconds later, Chris lapped him and finished first, as usual. For whatever reason, the only stable thing in Josh’s life since his sisters disappeared was Mario Kart on Mondays with Chris. Even when he was practically catatonic with grief and rage, Chris would come over and they’d sit there in complete silence for a few hours racing karts. It was dumb, but it gave him something to mark time with. He’d wonder how long he had gone without eating and if it was more than three days since Mario Kart, it was time to ingest sustenance. Everything was either BMK or AMK – Before Mario Kart or After Mario Kart. His therapy appointment was 2 AMK.

The weird thing was that they absolutely never talked about anything related to Josh’s sisters or his problems or anything central to his imminent collapse. It was just a few hours of mindless video games and meaningless chatter. Josh had no idea if it was Chris’s way of trying to give him a sense of normalcy or if he just had no idea how to deal with Josh’s situation. It didn’t really matter.

“So how’re you doing?” Chris asked with calculated casualness.

Josh froze. “Losing? As usual. I love to hate this game.”

“No, no, I mean just…in general. How are you holding up?”

It was an innocent, kind question, but Josh felt pinned down under a spotlight. One of the conditions of Monday Mario Kart was that they pretended everything was fine. Besides, Chris knew Josh wasn’t fine.

Didn’t he?

The evidence was probably pretty obvious to someone with half a brain. Josh had dropped a bunch of weight, dropped out of school, and seemed consistently injured. But on the other hand, he had told Chris literally nothing about how he was coping over the last few months. Certainly, his best friend had a right to be curious. But Josh couldn’t help but feel violated.

“Let’s not do this,” he sighed, flipping absently through the character selection screen.

Chris stiffened. “Do what? Care about you?”

“I know you care, idiot. You don’t have to prove anything,” Josh snapped, choosing a stage at random to distract from the conversation. When the race started, though, Chris’s kart sat at the finish line without moving. Josh refused to look at him, but he could practically feel Chris’s hurt two feet over. “Sorry,” Josh said quietly.

Just like that, the sanctity of Mario Kart Monday was ruined.

Chris didn’t respond for a minute, but when he did, he didn’t sound quite as hurt. “Is this what you need? Do you want to go on pretending everything’s fine? I love you, dude. And if you think that’s what you need, then I’ll do it. I won’t ask why you eat more pills than food and I won’t wonder what you’re thinking or feeling.” He paused and it felt like a crime not to spare him a glance, so Josh looked at him. “Just say the word, man. Tell me that’s what you need and I’ll do it. I won’t ask you again. But make sure that’s what you _need_ and not just what you _want_.”

Josh had no idea what he needed. But the thought of breaching the sacred oath of silence and the last normal relationship he had terrified him.

So he lied.

“It’s what I need.”

Chris eyed him over the top of his glasses, obviously conflicted. But true to his word, he nodded in hesitant agreement. “Alright. I’m not sure I’m doing the right thing here, but okay. I just want you to be okay. Let me know if you change your mind.”

So they never talked about it.

But Chris was right.

It wasn’t the right thing. It was the cowardly thing – the dangerous thing.

Josh never worked up the courage to tell him that.

 

Act 12

The only perk about being 21 that’s better than the ability to legally purchase alcohol is the ability to make the all-American, free choice to self-destruct whenever you damn well please. And by that, it meant that nobody could stop Josh from checking himself out of the mental health ward. He was in and out – had been for a long time. But Christmas rolled around and his parents were in Venice for some conference, so Josh decided “fuck it” and gave himself the Christmas gift of ill-advised freedom.

The doctors made him sign a million forms saying it wasn’t their fault if or when he blew his brains out or whatever. When their asses were sufficiently covered, Josh took a cab home for some quality time with his demons.

Not an hour into his sad little Christmas, the doorbell rang. Josh really couldn’t imagine who would be calling on the Washington household on Christmas, considering the circumstances. Shamefully, he kind of hoped it was his parents. Solo Christmas plans were pretty depressing as it turned out. Wrapping a bright red blanket around his shoulders, Josh shuffled to the front door and pulled it open.

It wasn’t his parents, but it _was_ company.

“Santa, is that you?”

“Wrong house. But I’ll slide down your chimney anytime,” Josh returned, purely on years of instinct. “Believe it or not, that sounded sexier in my head.”

“Well, you’d better keep it there next time.” Sam looked him up and down, a fond, if not slightly exasperated, smile on her face. He felt a little exposed under her careful examination, but he allowed it. “Can I come in?”

Josh shrugged and stepped aside so she could brush past him. “To what do I owe the pleasure?” His eyes caught on the takeout bag under her arm and he smiled. “That food better be for me.”

Sam pushed the takeout bag into his chest. “Apparently you listed me as your emergency contact at the hospital. As your wife, specifically. Flattering _and_ creepy, but we can come back to that later. They called to let me know you had turned down treatment and checked yourself out against their advisement.”

Oh, right. They had told Josh he had to put down either a legal guardian or a spouse as his emergency contact. He had figured keeping his parents out of the loop was best and Sam would know what he wanted in an emergency. At the very least, she might get a laugh out of it. “Don’t tell me you want a divorce. Not on Christmas, Sammy.”

She wandered past him into the kitchen and began sifting through his dishes. “Fine, not on Christmas. I’m calling my lawyer tomorrow, though.”

“Don’t you have family stuff today?”

Sam took the bag of food from him and dumped it on the counter to sort it out. “Yeah, I did. And now I’m doing more family stuff.”

Josh realized that he hadn’t exactly been fair to Sam. She had been almost as close to his sisters as he had – maybe even closer at times if he were to be truly honest. While he was busy wallowing in misery and self-loathing, he had hardly reached out to her. But somehow she knew when his parents were going out of town, because she would drop food off at his house and give him a once-over to make sure he was still in the world of the living. If someone put a gun to his head, he wouldn’t be able to tell them how she was doing.

“Um, thanks,” he said quietly, watching her pick through the silverware for the right sized fork.

“Don’t thank me, just answer your phone once in a while, would you?” She didn’t say it with any malice, but it hurt just the same. It hurt because she was right. Josh never picked up when she called, because he had no idea what to say. They were at weird, eerily similar points in their lives and if he didn’t know what the hell to do with himself, he sure wouldn’t know what to do with her. “Don’t look at me like that. It’s fine, Josh. I’m fine and we’re fine, alright?”

“Ugh, no we aren’t.”

Sam shrugged and grabbed a box of food before heading for the couch. “Yeah, but since you didn’t get me anything for Christmas, I’d like to formally request that we pretend we are for one day.”

Josh sighed and gathered up the rest of the food before following her to the couch. “Can I leave the hospital bracelet on or will that shatter the illusion?”

“Nah, I have a good imagination.”

They both did, apparently, because they kept the conversation light and frivolous for most of the night. His rapidly changing moods remained stable and nothing hovered in the shadows. It was one of his last few good nights, really.

“While I’ve got you nailed down in one place for the first time in forever, I’ve gotta ask you just one thing,” Sam said carefully. She probably wouldn’t have said it at all, but they were into a second bottle of wine that neither of them had planned on.

“You can nail me down any time,” he hiccupped. Sometimes Josh felt like it was a contractual obligation to turn everything she said into something terrible. It was just how things went. “But yeah, whatever. One question.”

“Do you think it’s someone’s fault, what happened? Like, when you think about why this happened, do you picture people or a concept?”

Even two bottles of wine in, the question left Josh unsettled. “I try not to picture anything, actually.”

“I picture people.”

Josh set his glass down and turned to give her an uncertain look. The last person he suspected of harboring a grudge was Sam. But it wasn’t the wildest thing he’d ever heard. “Who do you picture?” Honestly, he wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answer.

“Everyone. I picture everyone,” she whispered before draining the rest of her glass. “Them. And me.” She paused. “And you.”

Yeah.

That was the truth of it, wasn’t it?

It wasn’t _nobody’s_ fault. It was _everyone’s_ fault.

“I guess I do too.”

True to her word, Sam turned the conversation to something less serious. It never quite left Josh’s head, though. You can’t really blame a concept. But blaming people is easy and the temporary relief is practically narcotic. It took root in his brain, deep and tangled and impossible to dig out. It scared him as much as it thrilled him. You can’t punish a concept, but people are so _fragile_ and tangible and punishable. God, did it scare him.

The night was only slightly tainted by that parasitic thought. They both drank too much because it was easier to think of pointless conversation topics that way. At some point he kissed her for some reason or another. It had been known to happen from time to time, particularly when alcohol was involved.

“You know, Sammy. Call me crazy, but sometimes I entertain the idea that maybe I love you a little.”

Sam laughed. “And then you come to your senses?”

“Something like that.”

Josh didn’t have any senses left to come to, but the one favor he could do for her was let her think he was full of shit. Besides, Sam was made of better stuff than he was – the updated model. She was going to bounce back from all of this if for no other reason than her programming was better. It was embedded in her code. Adversity was a function of her swashbuckling nature.

She was a pirate after all.

Not him.

He started picking up the phone after that, although he lied about his activities and feelings more often than not. No matter how many times her encouragements echoed through the receiver into his eardrum, it couldn’t dig out the parasite festering in his brain.

Everyone’s fault.

 

Act 13

It was cold enough on that mountain to piss icicles, but a delirious sort of giddiness had seized Josh’s heart, fending off cold and hunger and reason like a septic fever. When exactly he had started seriously entertaining his increasingly cruel fantasies for revenge and humiliation was unclear. But idle fancies turned to casual plotting, which evolved steadily into active design and construction. In no time at all, events were in motion that could not be undone.

Josh remembered very little of his time on the mountain. He cycled rapidly between ardent, unadulterated productivity and crippling dysfunction. The hallucinations got worse – got meaner, more vivid, and more frequent. But everything fell together in time for the anniversary.

“How do you imagine this ends?” Hannah sang softly in his ear.

Well, not _really_ Hannah.

“I’m kinda hoping one of them pisses their pants,” Josh offered quietly to the darkness. He’d been wiring video feeds for days throughout the lodge, covering every angle and every corner. The hallucinations were always at full throttle when he neglected sleep the most. “I guess it ends with us paying for what we did.”

“We?” Beth’s voice had dropped lower and her face morphed slowly into that smug bastard from the clinic – Dr. Hill or whatever.

Josh laughed through his nose, twisting the wires together in the hole he’d cut in the drywall. “Do you think there’s going to be anything left for me after this?”

Dr. Hill nodded clinically. “Very clever, Joshua. By getting revenge on your friends, you get revenge on yourself. You’ll be all alone.”

Humming his acknowledgement, Josh dusted his shirt free of drywall dust and began gathering the debris.

“Quite ingenious. And here I was wondering why you plan to punish those least responsible so harshly. You’re not punishing them so much as you’re punishing yourself,” he rambled, following close on Josh’s heels while he headed to the next port. “Is this to be your end, Joshua? Alone and invisible on a mountain? How poetic.”

“It’s beautiful,” Beth and Hannah agreed in unison. Their voices sounded from everywhere and nowhere at once.

Josh laughed bitterly. “I’d say it’s sick.”

“Then why go through with it?” Dr. Hill pondered.

As much as he was enjoying the insomnia-fueled conversation with the broken parts of his brain, Josh decided to wash them out with a tall glass of rum. “The way I see it,” he reasoned, “sick is all I have left. You can’t fight horror with convention and poetry. All I have is what I’ve been left with.”

“Then you’re truly gone, Joshua.” Dr. Hill laughed and laughed and laughed until it dissolved into loud church bells tolling out Josh’s final sympathies into the pine tree thickets and whistling wind.

Time of death: 8:23 p.m.

 

**_Couldn’t put Humpty together again._ **

 

Clarity was like mist on that mountain: rarely there, but intangible, foggy, and sparse when it rolled in.

Things were red most days. Thick, smothering red clogged his eyes and ears and mind like rich velvet in a hot oven. If it wasn’t in his brain, the red was on his hands, slick and hot as it ran under his fingernails and teeth.

Red mist.

Sometimes, though, as the sun climbed down into a purple horizon tinged with his favorite colors, a bitter wind would blow up the mountainside and wash the red from his brain for a few moments. He could sit under the high-cropped pines and watch the helicopters circle the mountain, doubtfully seeking him anymore. Maybe. He had no idea how long it’d been since they left him there.

Even though his stomach groaned, his teeth ached where they crowded each other and multiplied by the day, and his eyes burned with the final rays of light, it was these moments he loved best. Sometimes he’d fancy that the helicopters would touch down and take him away from there. Other times he enjoyed the fruitlessness of their searches and the silence of his tomb.

But mostly he thought about frivolous things, like pineapple-topped pizza or video games or pirates.

And sometimes his sisters would sit with him laughing at his jokes or singing softly while he hummed old nursery rhymes and songs.

“Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,” he murmured off-key.

A helicopter dipped close to the neighboring pine thicket – closer than they had ever been. How many people were on board? How did they taste?

“Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.”

His ears caught a small animal dashing through the brush to his right. He couldn’t leave now, though. The sun was still visible.

“All the king’s horses and all the king’s men.”

Josh wondered selfishly if anyone missed him. Did they miss him like he missed the sun when it dipped under the sentries of his grave and the red curtain fell over his brain? Did they miss him like he missed himself?

It didn’t matter.

The sun became a sliver over the mountain, clouds falling heavy over the trees and his brain. The helicopter dipped too far West.

Beth put a hand over his and smiled. Josh smiled back and sang the last verse to the thinning air as the howls turned to shrieks.

“Couldn’t put Humpty together again.”

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> someone told me i couldn't write anything short or serious so i tried to prove them wrong. im not sure i managed to if we're being honest here.
> 
> but anyways. let me know what you thought if you didn't die of boredom in the process. i do so love hearing from u guys.
> 
> hang out with me on [tumblr](http://coldmackerel.tumblr.com) if you're as bored as i am.


End file.
